Blast Off at Solas Festival

Nine years ago I wrote a rockets show and workshop and took in on tour around Wales and England. That’s me back then – blasting off an alza seltzer rocket from a film canister at Hatherop Primary School. It was part of an MSc in communicating science, my dissertation title was ‘developing and evaluation space themed education materials for primary schools’. So I got to do space in schools. I loved it!

Now I’m taking rockets to the Solas Festival in Scotland. We’ll be blasting off in the big barn at 2.30pm on Saturday 22nd June. Here’s what the programme says:

5, 4, 3, 2, 1… BLAST OFF! Join us for an interactive family science show and workshop. Predict, experiment and discover the science behind forces as we launch rockets up into the air. Make your own straw rocket and enter it into our family rockets competition. We’ll finish up outside with one big blast off!

For the workshop section every family will make their own wee rocket and we’ll all have a chance to fire them through a hoop during our rockets competition.

  

The show ends outside with the water rockets – they go really high so we need to be outside for that. I’ve been ordering rockets from all over the place and they’ve started arriving in the post – rocket deliveries are really the best kind of deliveries to get!

I’ll also be storytelling in a yurt at 11.30am on the Saturday and I’ll be doing a bit of spoken word in the yurt late afternoon too so if you’re heading to the festival please do come and say hello. This is what I look like now by the way (I won’t be wearing that green T shirt but I do still have it!):

Top Tips for Solas

I’m excited about seeing one of my favourite shows ‘The Man Who Planted Trees‘. This will be the eighth time I’ve seen it. I know, I’m a groupie. In fact I like it so much I once interviewed the dog from it, he is very funny! Listen to the interview on audioboo here.

I’m also looking forward to seeing poets Liz Lochhead and Harry Baker. The music looks great too, I’m especially looking forward to seeing fab Edinburgh folk band Kite and the Crane again. There’s also a Zombie Science show that I feel I must see!

Oh and coming back to the space theme – can’t wait to see the show ‘Let’s talk about Space‘!

Find out more about the Solas Festival online.

 

Wood Foraging in Pictures

I’ve recently installed a woodburning stove in my lounge and I totally love it. So when Daniel said:

Doddsy, wood foraging next week?

I said YES! Daniel is a wood foraging pro:

Back in the day when we worked at Changeworks, I dreamed of getting a stove but most people told me it was a bad idea. Most people, but not Daniel. He had a stove and pointed out how easy (and fun) it was to forage for wood in Edinburgh. Four years later and there we were.

My bow saw was a bit smaller than Daniel’s so it took me a bit longer to cut through the logs:

This was the pile we cut between us in less than an hour:

Daniel suggested bringing a wheelie bin but I only had a wheelie suitcase. I filled it just as it started to rain:

I felt proud of the wood we’d chopped as I walked back through the trees:

But when I got to the streets I suddenly felt a little self conscious. Did people assume I lived in the wild and had decided to return home and all of my worldly belongings were logs?

When I got home I started my first log pile, hurrah!:

My arm ached a little but I loved the experience of cutting my own fuel and being outdoors. Thanks to Daniel, I’ll be foraging again soon and next winter I’ll have the pleasure of burning those logs!

Just in case you were wondering, the wood was already dead and lying on the ground, we just cut it into bits. 

 

Social Media is like Baking

I’ve been thinking about cake lots lately (mmm).My friend Claire (above) just started a cake business. She’s been inventing cakes and I’ve been helping her by trying them. It’s a tough job but someone’s got to do it! I also came up with the name for her business (Home is Where the Cake Is) and these last three Saturdays I’ve ended up at an afternoon tea so with all that cake I started to realise…

Social Media is like baking

Well, sort of. Imagine you’re inventing a new cake. You’d try putting a few things together based on what’s worked before. You’d have some essentials but you’d maybe try new combinations or add something different. Then you bake it. If it’s good people enjoy eating it. If it’s really good they ask you for the recipe.

Leith Library was named as the best social media contributor to Book Week in Scotland. The cake we baked turned out well so now I’ve been asked to share the recipe at Social Media for Social Good in Glasgow tomorrow. I can tell people how to make our cake but really, I want to tell people to go and invent their own cake using the ingredients they already have in their organisation. My top tips would be:

• Use the resources you already have
• Don’t be afraid to try something different
• Plan for some of what you’re doing
• Make space for the spontaneous
• Don’t forget to have fun

Often the reason we don’t just try new and exciting ways of engaging with people using social media is because we’re afraid. We’re afraid of what people might think. We’re afraid it might go wrong. Or other people are afraid on our behalf. Perhaps we’re afraid we don’t have a good enough idea but people are made to generate ideas. People are brilliant, they are the best resource. People make things happen not social media. Social media is just a tool to share ideas and make connections. It’s a giant tea party!

If you can’t be at tomorrow’s conference but want to follow online just follow the hashtag #begoodbesocial on twitter. You can read about what we did at Leith Library for Book Week Scotland on my blog here.  I’m also speaking about Bookweek at the CILIPS Library conference in Dundee in June.

 

Firefly Magazine

There was a big white envelope waiting on the doormat. Inside was my copy of the exciting new children’s magazine Firefly:

It’s a seasonal magazine which includes outdoor activities, puzzles, comics, wildlife, books, craft and cooking. The magazine is aimed at children 5 to 10 years or as the cover says “it’s for families who are wild at heart”.

Flicking through the pages you’ll notice Firefly is visually stunning. I think what makes it special is the contributions from many different illustrators and writers. I was commissioned to write a 2 page nature feature for the magazine and I chose to write about otters:

Why Otters? 

Otters are an animal most children won’t have seen but would like to spot. They’ve got character, they do funny things like pooping on the tops of rocks or tufts of grass so everyone can see where they’ve been. Urban otters are getting much more common so even if you live in a city you won’t be too far from an otter. They’re inclusive but not too common to be ordinary. I’ve tried to spot otters myself a few times so otter spotting is something close to my heart.

The Writing Process

First I found out as much as I could about otters online, in books and by asking people. I interviewed an otter expert (Chris Cathrine from Caledonian Conservation) and I spent time choosing the best bits from everything I learned. The hardest thing I think is condensing all of that research. Which bits stay and which bits go?

I wrote sections in bite sized chunks and gradually and ruthlessly chopped out sections until I was only left with the best. I want to make children laugh or tell them something so weird and wonderful that they would want to tell their friends or family about it. That way they’re much more likely to remember it.

If I used a complicated word I made sure I explained what it meant. I used to write the Dino’s Dynamos Kids Club magazine for Dynamic Earth so that really helped with knowing how to write and plan to communicate science to children. I had a good editor back then so I got told which bits worked and which didn’t. Later I edited the magazine when new writers started writing it so I think that whole process helped me to be objective and to really weed out every word that isn’t necessary.

I included Chris Cathrine’s answer to “What is the funniest thing you’ve ever seen an otter do?” because I knew children would love finding out something like that from an otter expert. I thought about the illustrations we would need to go with the text and made notes and found examples in books so I could send these to the illustrator who was working on my section (Cat O’ Neil).

I spent lots more time rewriting and cutting to get down to the word limit I’d been set.

Help, I can’t think of an otter joke!

I was desperately trying to come up with a good otter joke but hadn’t managed it. I went along to the Edinburgh Literary Salon for a much needed break from writing. It’s a monthly get together for writers and anyone involved in books and publishing. My friend Alan McIntosh was there (I interviewed him on this blog here) and knowing how quick-witted he is I explained I was trying to come up with a good otter joke. Here’s how the rest of the conversation went:

Alan: Tell me about them, where do they live, what are the names for things?

Me: Their homes are holts, their poos are spraints, they eat fish…

Alan: What do you get if you tread on an otter poo?

Me (smile)

Alan: A spraint ankle!

It was perfect, exactly what I was looking for. Any joke about poo is a big hit with children but they also love to learn a new word that they can show off with by using it in a joke. Funny and educational. When you laugh you learn more so massive thanks to Alan for that one!

Finishing

When I finally submitted my feature it included a page of extra ideas, things like a dot to d’otter (otter dot to dot) or having a hidden spraint (otter poo) somewhere in the magazine for children to find. Firefly Editor Hannah Foley liked my ideas. She decided to add an extra page called ‘Otter Fun’ to include the puzzles and extra ideas so now I’ve ended up writing a three page spread on otters. My text went to copy editor Genevieve Herr and she was happy with it, she made some minor changes and that was me done.

It really is amazing to see the magazine in print. I just need to order a copy for my nephews and nieces!

Order your copy of Firefly Magazine on the Firefly website here. Find Firefly Magazine on Twitter and Facebook. 

 

Keep on Running

Hannah was running the London Marathon while we were on the sidelines with pints of Shandy and cheers. I took this as she ran past. We told her to keep going and that she was doing great. She said her feet hurt.

“It’s the cheers that keep you going” that’s what they say. I’ve never run a marathon and don’t think I ever will but last week I started running again. I ran on Thursday and last night too. I ran by the sea and the oyster catchers scuttled across my path. I’m excited to be running again. The thing is I’ve been a bit ill since Christmas. I’ve not been able to cycle or run or even walk too far.

It’s been frustrating. All sorts of strange things kept happening to me. For two weeks I couldn’t move for 2 hours every morning. The doctors said it was an arthritic hangover, over night my muscles were seizing up and in the morning they just didn’t work. It’s taken a few months to recover and at the same time a close family member was diagnosed with cancer. On top of that I’ve been having building work in my flat. It was supposed to take a few days and it’s ended up taking 9 weeks.

So all in all I was struggling a bit but I didn’t really tell people. I thought it would pass and I’d be alright. I managed to keep up with work but I didn’t manage to keep up with all of my friends or the social things that were happening around me.

Eventually I realised I needed to be brave and tell people I was struggling. When you’re going through something difficult you need people to cheer you on, to tell you to keep going. Just to be there with you on the sidelines.

So I did it, I told a bunch of people I trust and things started to get better. Just the act of telling people in itself was so good. I think it’s hard to admit you can’t do things sometimes or to admit you need help but we do need each other. Last week I started running again and I remembered… it’s the cheers that keep us going!

 

Digital storytelling with Young and Old

Just a quick blog to let you know about a couple of digital storytelling projects I’m working on over the next few weeks with two quite different groups of people, teenagers in Leith and older people in Govan.

This weekend I met with four teenagers at Leith Library for our first podcast workshop. The teenagers are making a young adult fiction podcast (read more about how they applied to the project on the leith library blog here). It was brilliant to meet them for the first time. I was impressed with their ideas and how well they worked together even though they’d only just met. They’re preparing some questions and doing a bit of research before next week’s session where they’re interviewing author Keith Gray. The week after it’s Roy Gill. I can’t wait to see how they go and what they produce at the end. So that’s the teenagers, next it’s the older people…

Tomorrow I start a six-week digital storytelling project in Govan with older people from the Govan Reminiscence Group. I’m working with Brian Wilkinson from the Britain from Above project (find them on twitter @AboveBritain) and we’ll be working with the group to help them to create and share their own digital stories about Govan. We’ll be looking at aerial photographs and talking about how Govan has changed over the years. The group have done similar projects before but they’ve not been able to tell the stories they’ve wanted to tell so this time it’s different – the group are going to choose their stories and learn to add images to their stories and share them at a celebration event.

I’m excited to see what both groups produce and I know we’re going to learn from each other throughout the process. I feel privileged to be working with such interesting people and to have the opportunity to help them to tell and share their stories.

The two older women above were part of a reminiscence workshop I facilitated with Generation Arts.

 

Pirate Emily

I did it – dressed as a pirate for World Book Night and had a parrot on my shoulder (well on my back but close enough!). I was giving away copies of Treasure Island with my Leith Library Reader in Residence pirate hat on. We wanted to encourage people to read by doing something a little different so we hid in a secret Leith Location with a giant golden macaw called Bongo.

There’s Treasure in Them There Books!

To find us people had to solve clues using a new library resource www.ourtownstories.co.uk. They used old maps and photos of Leith to solve the clues to reveal a secret pirate postcode. Then they just had to go there and look for a pirate flag. I had a lot of fun taking photos of the clues with various pirate backgrounds. Captain Colm had fun covering paper with tea and baking it in the oven to make it look old!

You can have a go at solving the clues on the Leith Library blog here.

X Marks the Spot

It was fab when people actually found us! We gave them copies of Treasure Island and let them choose from a range of prizes donated by local businesses too.  We had a pirate wardrobe for people to delve into and we took photos of them in pirate gear with the parrot.

Pirate Portraits

Children were carefully positioned in front of the parrot so it looked like it was on their shoulder. Adults did the real thing. Check out the photos of all the pirates who came to visit here.

So what was it like to have a parrot on your back? To tell you the truth I was petrified. The parrot was very nice but it flapped and made loud noises and I’m just a bit scared of big birds with big beaks being close to my head!

Thanks to The Crew

Captain Colm (he’s a digital librarian – he masterminded the clues)

1st Mate Victoria (Made the voyage from Carlisle with her parrot)

Pirate Jim (let us capture the Leith Agency’s Barge)

Leith Library Staff Pirates (who dressed up to mark the occasion)

I drove the parrot home, not to Carlisle but to Leith. He has two homes like the Queen. It was very strange – looking in my mirror to see Bongo looking back! That was yesterday, my day as a pirate.

I’ve written about our day and the treasure hunters who found us on the Leith Library blog here.